Thanks for your clues for DUCKWORTH-LEWIS METHOD. The answer lent itself to some charming cryptic definitions, like Strummer's "Settles the scores on a rainy day" and the winner is wellywearer2 for conveying the intricacies of the cricketing calculation and even including the hyphen with "Batty formula: 0 = -50 + 2.718watts = mode". Kudos. Your suggestions for another clue are sought below.

The news in clues

Lord Justice Leveson must be on some kind of anger-suppressant medication. How else can a person listen, day after day, to conceited clod after insolent dolt without holding up a finger and saying something? Something like "Excuse me, can I interrupt you? You have a single life to live - if you choose to squander it on ruining others', that's one thing. But if you continue to sit there and make out that you're serving the public good, I may have to cut off your lips with these civil-service-issue paper scissors. Kapeesh?"

On the subject of institutions hoping to get away with it in 2012, Anax offered a pointed clue in the same day's Independent...

7d It displaysBigCitydelusion, but it's not a bank (8,7)

...for a BUILDINGSOCIETY.

Device of the week

Audacious stuff from Bonxie in Friday's Guardian. We noted in our recent spotlight on soundalike clues that mirthless solvers enjoy looking for ways in which the clued phrase does not sound precisely like the answer, even though the whole exercise is supposed to be fun. Bonxie braved such wrath with a clue...

21/20d Plaintive animal sounds heard in area of common comparison (3,4,2,5)

...which, via "the sighs of whales", gives us THE SIZE OF WALES.

Those north of Hadrian's Wall - whose speech remains unaffected by what some call "the wine/whine merger" where "hw"s become mere "w"s - might be less likely to confuse cetacean whimpering with 20,779 sq km, but they can still enjoy the wordplay. Incidentally, I've never heard a whale wracked with sobs, but I imagine the sound is kind of blubbery.

Radio 4's More Or Less has taken the use of "the size of Wales" as an index of measurement to various semi-logical conclusions, including noting that the former Soviet Union, at 22,402,200 sq km, is equal to roughly 1,000 areas the size of Wales - which of course would be a kiloWales.

This week's cluing competition is about my favourite unit of measurement, from the facetious furlongs-per-fortnight system used by engineers and hackers - the MICROFORTNIGHT. Suggestions below please.

Themes and tricks

One thing we thought we knew about the Times cryptic was its reliable restraint: it doesn't identify its solvers and it doesn't go in for themed puzzles or risk frivolity with self-referentiality. And then on Tuesday, the world turned upside-down:

Today is the fortieth anniversary of Wadham Sutton's first crossword for The Times. This is his puzzle no. 1,404

That introduction might not seem like much, but to a regular Times solver, the effect is like seeing Huw Edwards reading the Ten O'Clock News in a steston and a onesie. Not only did we know who had set this fine puzzle: it was also themed, with TIMES CROSSWORD reading across the third row, SUTTON's own name appearing in an accolade you can't argue is unearned, a reference to Alan Bennett's FORTY YEARS ON and a series of images of 1972, when Sutton's first puzzle was published. And with the COD WAR, NIXON and WATERGATE, a RIOT and a MINERS' strike, what a dreary yet familiar picture it is.

Clue of the Week, though, relates to a different singer who duetted with George Michael. It's nominated by Dave Tilley, who reviewed the puzzle in question, Notabilis's Telegraph Toughie on Friday, at Big Dave's Crossword Blog:

13d Words of Candle in the Wind, perhapsalineto eulogise more (3,7)

The answer, which you see once you've got the cryptic definition at the start, is WAX LYRICAL. Many thanks to Dave; if you'd like to nominate any clues this week, please do so below.